HealthBridge Nursing Home Strikers To Return To Work Monday

Striking workers at five HealthBridge nursing homes must be reinstated by Monday, U.S. District Judge Robert Chatigny ruled Wednesday.

"I felt like God is finally answering our prayers, and justice will slowly be served," said Yanitza Mendez, a licensed practical nurse at the Newington Health Care Center for the last six years.

Mendez and nearly 700 union members went on strike in July after the company terminated the pension and required employee contributions to health care premiums. Now, they will keep their former level of benefits, as the two sides continue bargaining for a new contract.

"I know we all have to pay something" for health insurance premiums, Mendez said, "but it really wasn't a realistic amount."

The contract that this ruling overturns required full-time workers to pay $475 a month to keep the same level of family insurance coverage.

Mendez and about 200 other Service Employees International Union members from around the state marched the picket line outside the Newington nursing home for a short while at midday Wednesday, to celebrate the ruling.

Chatigny said the roughly 600 workers must be brought back, even as it means hundreds of replacement workers will lose their jobs at the nursing homes in Newington, Milford, Westport, Stamford and Danbury.

HealthBridge did not say how many replacement workers will be terminated as a result of the ruling. The company has appealed the injunction, but unless either Chatigny himself stays the order, or a higher court issues an emergency stay, the strikers will go back to work while the appeal is pending.

As cars left the parking lot, some of the workers yelled: "No more scabs!"

About 70 union members who crossed the picket lines and worked under the contract imposed by HealthBridge will lose the pay raises the company had implemented, but will have their pensions and former health insurance benefits restored.

Romulus Philogene, who has worked in housekeeping at Westbrook for a dozen years, said he was on the picket line in Westbrook with 20 co-workers when he heard the news.

"We were screaming in joy together," he said. Philogene, who makes $16.62 an hour, said he'd have a hard time finding as well-paying a job.

Chatigny granted the National Labor Relations Board request for an injunction because, in his judgment, the union is likely to win a separate trial in the NLRB system. In that case, the NLRB alleges that HealthBridge broke the law by unilaterally implementing the benefit cuts and by locking out union members in Milford for four months. That lockout began one year ago, on Dec. 13.

A company spokeswoman complained that this injunction short-circuits the legal process.

Jonathan Kreisberg, regional director of the NLRB, said the trial will reconvene next week, but probably won't meet again after that until February.

"I'm hoping this could maybe serve as a vehicle to get these parties to the table," he said. If the company and the union settle on a new contract, the company could avoid paying back pay for the six months of the strike.

Kreisberg called the injunction "an incredible win" for his agency, which protects workers' rights. While other employers have agreed to hire back strikers over the years, the last time there was a reinstatement this large was in 1989, when Colt Manufacturing was ordered by an administrative law judge to bring back 800 union members who had been striking for three and a half years. The union members didn't return until the next year.

HealthBridge and SEIU District 1199 have been in conflict for years in both Connecticut and New Jersey, with each side accusing the other of repeatedly breaking the law.

In a statement issued in response to the ruling Wednesday, HealthBridge spokeswoman Lisa Crutchfield said: "implementation of an injunction returning the striking SEIU members to the workplace would expose residents to the very people who sought to do them harm during the July 3 walkout. The acts of criminality committed against our residents by some of those going out on strike on July placed our residents in serious jeopardy, and we find it unfathomable that these individuals would be returned to care for our residents before those responsible are identified and prosecuted."

HealthBridge reported vandalism at three of the five homes to police, who could not identify any suspects. In two homes, patients with dementia had their identities switched or obscured, but supervisors prevented any harm by straightening out the confusion.

Before the strike, HealthBridge had offered to take all issues to binding arbitration, if the union would agree to freeze the pension. The company contributes 8 percent of payroll for the pension.

Sue Simone, who has worked in the laundry department at Newington for 29 years, said she couldn't agree to giving up the pension, which pays about $800 a month to the typical retiree with 30 years of service.

"I'm fighting for myself, my family, everyone that is in a union," Simone said. She earns over $20 an hour, and said, "It's hard to save money on your own. The Social Security is not that much."